Emaikwu Sunday Oche
The purpose of this research work was to assess the effects of prompt feedback as a motivational strategy on students’ achievement in secondary school mathematics. The design of this study was a quasi-experimental pretest posttest research design using intact classes. A sample of 300 students randomly selected from five secondary schools in Makurdi and Gwer West Local Government Areas in Benue State was used in this study. The instrument used for data collection was a 30-item cognitive achievement test in mathematics (CATIM) developed by the researcher for the purpose of measuring students’ achievement in mathematics. The reliability coefficient for the instrument using Cronbach coefficient alpha was 0.89. In this study, four research questions were answered and four hypotheses were tested. The results indicated that students taught using prompt feedback performed better than those taught without using prompt feedback approach; there was no significant difference in mean performance between boys and girls when they are exposed to feedback. Moreover, students of different age brackets tend to perform creditably when feedback is applied promptly. Location (urban or rural) does not affect the performance of students when they are exposed to prompt feedback. The paper recommends among others that competent mathematics teachers be recruited, remunerated and motivated so as to employ a comprehensive teaching methodology imputed with concrete experiences in order to obviate cognitive dissonance and frustration associated with learning failures in mathematics.
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